Mapping and Leveraging Your Agency Ecosystem

Sei-Wook Kim (00:03.285) On today's episode, we're talking about ecosystems, how to map them, understand them, and intentionally leverage them to drive agency growth. We'll break down what an ecosystem actually is, how it shapes positioning and go-to-market, the different archetypes of strong ecosystem plays, how compounding works inside the right ecosystem, and how to diagnose misalignment. Peter Kang (00:27.941) All right, Sei-Wook. Part of this comes from an app we actually built. On Agency Habits, our site for agency operators, we released an app. It's called the Agency Habits Foundation app. If you go to foundation.agencyhabits.com, you can get a free positioning audit. Part of our framework on this app is about ecosystems. We have over 100 submissions, actually closer to 150 submissions at this point. Just looking through it, it's been fascinating to see the different types of ecosystems that agencies play in. Today we should definitely go into detail about what we actually mean when we talk about ecosystems, and from there we can highlight some really good examples that we found from our app submissions. Sei-Wook Kim (01:28.119) Cool. All right. Let's talk about what an ecosystem actually is. When we talk about ecosystem in this context, it's really about where in the world your agency is known. If you think about whether there is a professional community where your agency name comes up in conversations, if there is a specific network of people that refer you to new engagements, or if there's any other environment or community where your ICP naturally gathers and discusses business. Peter Kang (02:09.629) Yeah, just to make sure people understand, ecosystem isn't the positioning statement. That's very different from what we classically think about as a positioning statement — like, this is what we do for whom. This is also not about your service offering. It's really about what are the spaces and the places and the networks that you play in. Sei-Wook Kim (02:40.906) Yeah, and it's again about who are the people in that space. We'll go into some examples, but the people in that space — what conversations are they having about your category and about services that you or your company can provide. Peter Kang (02:59.176) Yeah. What are some examples of a weak ecosystem, and then let's talk about what are some of the stronger ones that we can go into with examples. Sei-Wook Kim (03:09.28) Yeah, some of the weaker ones — if it's too broad, like "we work in tech" or "we serve startups," just broad groups and audiences of people without a lot of focus. Peter Kang (03:21.151) Yeah, the startup one kills me, and sometimes it's like "hey, we only work with tech startups," and people stop at that and say yeah, that's our ecosystem. We talk to VCs, we talk to founders, and stop there. I think we're here to make the argument that you can be more intentional, you can go deeper. Some of the things we're going to cover will go into even more specific things like platforms, professional associations, and more depth beyond the platform. So let's kick it off. Sei-Wook Kim (03:57.964) Yeah. The first is thinking about an infrastructure ecosystem and having depth there. One of the submissions came from an agency that focuses in a narrow industrial market where they really dove deep and understood what the vertical is and what are the software layers behind it. They identified that there are three key ERP systems that dominate the entire industry. If you think about the industry and how you can really focus on something that all of those qualified buyers use, that's how they narrowed down into the ERPs. Peter Kang (04:44.798) Yeah, and these folks actually went pretty deep. They built integrations with those ERPs. They also had tools pre-configured for those platforms so that in this defined space, they have things ready to go. In their marketing language and how they go to market, they definitely reference all these different infrastructure layers. This is specifically around manufacturers — industrial distribution and manufacturing — so if you're in the industry and you come across this agency, they're already speaking your language. It's like, "oh, these guys know what the hell they're talking about." Sei-Wook Kim (05:26.997) Yeah. If you think about the whole ecosystem there, there are ERP consultants that could refer them in for a particular part of the integration work. There could be other systems integrators and other platforms that interact with them and can be referrers. And then the people on the client side, your ICP — you're really aligned with them through software, not just marketing or other services, but really tightly integrated with the key part of their business. Peter Kang (06:06.908) Yeah, and when you think about how this compounds over time and what value accrues to this agency for being intentional with their ecosystem — obviously the referrals are stronger from those in their ecosystem, the buyers are able to make decisions more easily, and there's specificity in their delivery because they've already done these integrations before and can deliver more efficiently. Their cost of acquiring new clients drops, the deals are of higher quality, and there's a referral loop that starts to happen. Once again, there's strength in being very intentional and really looking at that infrastructure layer. So it's really about: define your industry, but then go a level or two deeper to understand where you might play. Sei-Wook Kim (07:03.914) Awesome. Let's move on to the next one. This is around a vertical ecosystem, especially around regulated industries. When we talk about verticals and regulated industries, some examples could be cannabis, legal, healthcare, CPG — areas where there's very specific information and knowledge you need to operate there. Essentially, the buyer has a very small community where they're operating. Peter Kang (07:46.993) Yeah, vertical — I think when a lot of folks think about ecosystems, they'd say if I'm in a certain vertical, okay, there are conferences you go to, there are clients and where they hang out, and that's true. But one of the things to ask is whether being part of that vertical is defensible to some degree. Is there a competitive advantage to being in that vertical, and why? This is why we tend to see that regulated industries are a more powerful vertical ecosystem. You mentioned CPG — there are aspects of CPG where there might be regulation, but if you're doing stuff for a beauty brand or food and beverage where there's not much regulatory hurdle or deeper knowledge necessarily required, and you're just making marketing campaigns or websites, it's not as defensible. But when you're talking about something like healthcare, that's where some of that knowledge really comes to bear. From there, you can be really specific about building the network off of your expertise in navigating the regulated space. Sei-Wook Kim (09:28.681) Yeah, that's an important area, because especially in these spaces there are aspects of compliance where there are probably other vendors who focus on, say, financial services security requirements or healthcare data privacy, and there are third-party vendors that help with that compliance. Being aligned with those vendors and having experience there could be a strong referral source for your agency. The more involved and deeper you are — with the industry trade groups and communities — they basically understand that you have expertise that's really hard to replicate. Peter Kang (10:15.376) Yeah, exactly. That expertise translates into trust, because when you're highly regulated, there's a cost or risk in not being compliant with the regulations. If you run afoul of privacy laws or certain regulations around how you might advertise your services, the government will fine you or you might get sued. It's about being able to show prospective clients that you can trust us because we know the space, we know the things you're going to have to worry about. This is where you get to really separate from the generalists who probably have no idea and are thinking about it more superficially. Sei-Wook Kim (11:13.495) Yeah, and thinking about how this compounds over time by going deeper — speaking at trade conferences, the more expertise you have, you're not just attending but you're being the thought expert in front of a larger audience at conferences, or even in industry-specific media where you can build credibility that you really have that experience. Going deeper with all of these vendors, being hyper aware of who are the big players and how you can be the parties they refer to reduce the risk of implementation. Ultimately, the more buyers that know you're a specialist and an expert in this regulated environment, the more they'll trust you, the faster you'll win work — so your sales cycles should shorten — and in terms of pricing, the more you're an expert in this specific area, the stronger pricing power you'll have, which could overall help your margins for delivery. Peter Kang (12:26.469) Yeah. Okay, cool. We talked about the infrastructure layer, we talked about the vertical. The next one we're calling the institutional referral ecosystem. An institutional ecosystem is when you think about your clients — sometimes you don't access them directly, but you get to them through other professionals who influence or control their vendor selection. Let's think about, for example, if you're an agency doing wayfinding design for higher ed — sometimes you're not going to be brought to the table by the higher ed institution directly, but you're going to be recommended by the architects who are heading that campus project. So this is all about mapping the ecosystem to the professional gatekeepers who then influence your ICP. There are other examples: consultants who might recommend agencies to law firms, ERP implementers who might suggest other partners familiar with their platform, compliance advisors — these are other gatekeepers that bring agencies to the clients. This is where it's super interesting — you're one step removed from your client, but now you really have to develop relationships with these gatekeepers. Sei-Wook Kim (14:09.668) Yeah, it's interesting because in some of these cases, your client may actually be these partners instead of the end client. To your example, the wayfinding agency — your client may be the architecture firm, not the organization building the building. Your relationship and your ability to gain in that space is different than who you may think, and different from who is the end user of your work. Peter Kang (14:42.988) Yeah, this is pretty interesting. It reminds me, back in the day before Barrel's Shopify focus on ecom, there was a stretch where we were doing a ton of websites for cultural arts institutions, especially in the dance space. Part of that was because we were brought in by a marketing agency that worked exclusively with cultural arts institutions. They had the trust of countless institutions, so they made sure we were included in all the RFPs. With their stamp of approval, we won a bunch of deals. I remember that time where we did at least half a dozen really well-known dance organizations' websites. This is a clear case where, if this is your ecosystem, it's really important to know the folks who have the ear of your clients. Sei-Wook Kim (15:46.158) Yeah, and the important thing we learned from that experience is that the true people who influence the decisions for who to hire was actually the marketing agency who had a close, long-standing relationship and a very strong reputation in that space with the end client. Our job was to really build that relationship with the marketing agency over time by executing and delivering for them. Peter Kang (16:13.548) Yeah, cool. The way this compounds is pretty obvious — just get that first project in and it's going to build confidence in you. But once again, it's about understanding the trust network beyond just the end client, and that's super important. Sei-Wook Kim (16:36.358) Awesome. Cool. So we covered a few areas of ecosystems. I would say there's also the power of intersection or overlap between ecosystems. If you have deep credibility in a platform — a tech platform or some kind of service platform — but also with a specific vertical, those are reinforcing communities. In the example with the ERP within a manufacturing space, that's an example of overlap or intersection between two ecosystems. It really helps you because you're able to get referral loops and partners from two different directions, not just a tech platform but also from vertical peers. Peter Kang (17:34.167) Yeah, we've talked about this multiple times. With Barrel, the decision to go beyond just being a Shopify agency and really double down on CPG, specifically food and beverage, and that intersection of commerce for CPG food and bev has been a big unlock. When you talk to Shopify, you can be very specific: we want to be the best at implementing Shopify commerce solutions for CPG food and bev clients. So to our partner manager, whoever it is — hey, just put the word out, that's what we want to focus on, and we have deep expertise. Look at our logos, look at all the problems we've solved specific to that vertical. But then when you go to the other side — whether it's marketing leaders, directors of ecom, or even founders at the CPG food and bev level — it's like, "these are the guys who work with all the cool brands in our space, they've done their Shopify implementation, they know all the stuff about the Shopify ecosystem, they're also knowledgeable about Klaviyo or Recharge and other things that are going to be important to us." And these things start to reinforce each other. You get other founders or clients the agency has worked with on the CPG food and bev side saying good things, and then you've got Shopify saying good things, and it starts to create this nice momentum and halo effect that just makes it easier to win new business. The compounding is really self-evident and you're able to increase lead volume as a result. It's not that Barrel only does food and beverage — there are other aspects of CPG, they have some fashion apparel clients and some beauty skincare clients — but making that choice to be super focused on this particular ecosystem of food and bev has been a big unlock in terms of the energy and reach that you get. Sei-Wook Kim (20:15.91) So to bring it back to the Foundation app, the Agency Habits Foundation app, with 100-plus — closer to 150 — submissions, you can see frequent issues that came up. One of the top things was just misalignment: what does the agency want versus what is the gap there? One example is an agency that wants to move into enterprise clients, but their existing ecosystem is really driven by the founder network in the startup space. They want to be known in one world but they actually operate and exist in conversations in another world. The gap there isn't about messaging, because essentially you're messaging to the wrong audience — they're just completely different ecosystems. Thinking about that, there are a few questions you can ask to figure out what your ecosystem is. Just think about your last 10 clients. Where did they come from? Is it from a specific network? Is it conversations from a specific tech platform? In those conversations, what was the context where your agency's name first came up? And versus your stated ICP, does that match where you're actually being found? Is there a mismatch? And are you spending time in those communities and ecosystems where your ideal buyer actually exists, or are you spending time in other ones? Really just taking a step back and assessing what is your actual ecosystem currently versus where you hope to be. Peter Kang (22:16.13) Yeah, I'll tell you a quick story where this was a big waste of time. You and I both went to Columbia, and I thought, let's tap the Columbia network and just reach out to as much alumni as we can. I worked with a firm that helped us set this up, and I had maybe 20-plus conversations in a very short time with different alums. It was a bit of a waste of time because some of these people worked at huge corporations, some at startups, the industries were all over the place. Sure, they were nice about it — yeah, alumni, whatever — but it just fell flat. The ICP probably wasn't clear enough, that was mistake number one. And the way I talked about it was like, yeah, looking for ecommerce and stuff like that. The idea was if you network with these people and build a relationship, they might be able to identify areas that could be helpful or refer us. But it just fell flat. That energy could have been better spent on an ecosystem that had more alignment with what we were trying to do and where our expertise was at that time. It was a waste of time. Sei-Wook Kim (23:47.413) Yeah. Taking a step back and understanding where people are finding you, where you exist in conversation — what is your true ecosystem where you're operating. Peter Kang (24:01.017) Yeah, and that goes to the strategy aspect of this ecosystem. There are really two key options any agency should think about. You map your ecosystem and you're like, okay, this is where we should be playing. Option one: should we go deeper? You have some kind of platform, maybe it's the intersection of platform plus vertical. Now, do we try to climb the partner tier of the platform ecosystem? Do we try to get more speaking engagements at the trade shows where our vertical ecosystem is? Are there other third-party consultants that work with our vertical that we can get into as well? You have a roadmap for going deeper. Option two is to expand to an adjacent ecosystem. Maybe your ICP doesn't quite fit the ecosystem you thought you were in, and you need to expand. Some of that could be like — we talked about having a generic ecosystem definition of "tech" or whatever — but maybe you narrow in and say, "we work specifically with ecom SaaS companies and help them with their marketing websites." Maybe that's too narrowly defined, and you can expand to, say, data analytics SaaS companies, where there's some overlap but it gives you a little more extension to go into. Once you start making those decisions, you can take a step back and ask: where do I need to spend more time? How do I get more familiar with that space? Who are the folks I need to have relationships with? Those are all the things that come into play once you become more intentional and focused. Sei-Wook Kim (26:26.942) Yeah, and the main thing is you have limited bandwidth to focus on things. You can't go into all of the different ecosystems and try to really win there. It's about picking and choosing what makes the most sense to get the most depth. To recap some of the areas and think about ecosystems as a compounding asset — there are a few traits I want to call out. First, having that clearly named ecosystem and defining it. Building a lot of depth or proof assets, showing that you're able to deliver for that specific ecosystem. And then aligning closely with the ICP within that ecosystem — through community groups, speaking events, partnerships, et cetera — just really building that alignment with that specific group. Peter Kang (27:34.849) Yep. Thinking about the benefits of all that — the referrals are compounding, customer acquisition costs decrease, deal quality improves, pricing power is obviously a big thing. And you develop a more competitive moat, because one of the most important things as an agency is to be differentiated in some way. Being intentional with your ecosystem is one step in that direction. Sei-Wook Kim (28:08.224) Cool. All right. As a closing thought: if somebody in your ICP were to ask their peers for a recommendation today, think about in what community or context would that question be asked — and honestly, would your name come up in that conversation? That's really the test of what your ecosystem is and whether you're truly a player in it. Peter Kang (28:37.04) Yeah, awesome. All right, that's a lot of ecosystem talk for one day, so thank you all for joining us, and until next time, we'll see you. Sei-Wook Kim (28:44.969) Thanks.